


Birthday Boy

by LindsayBay



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Daryl Dixon and Merle Dixon are Young, Family, Gen, Young Daryl Dixon, Young Merle Dixon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-15
Updated: 2017-12-15
Packaged: 2019-02-15 05:53:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13024629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LindsayBay/pseuds/LindsayBay
Summary: Merle becomes a big brother. This is a sequel to my story 'Momma'.





	Birthday Boy

Merle hated when his stepmother had her sister over. He hid in his bedroom for as long as he could, but hunger eventually drove him out. He could hear his stepmother, Luvadia, moaning. “I’m telling you, I’m in labor!” **  
**

“It’s way too early. It’s just, what do you call it, Braxton-Hicks,” Luverne said.

Merle headed for the kitchenette to make himself a sugar sandwich for breakfast. “Boy, get your momma a glass of water,”  Luverne called from the living room couch.

“She ain’t my momma,” Merle grumped as he fetched a plastic tumbler from the dish drainer and filled it up.

“Oughta be nicer to your stepmom. She’s the closest thing you got to a momma now. I bet you don’t even remember your real momma.” Luverne said.

Merle didn’t say anything as he handed the tumbler to Luvadia. He most certainly did remember his mother. She smelled good, unlike Luvadia, who smoked so much that the stink of cigarettes came out of her pores. His mother liked to go out and have fun, not sit on the broke-down couch all day watching soap operas and drinking Boone’s Farm wine and saying mean things about people.

Merle headed back into the kitchenette to make his sandwich, smearing cheap margarine on stale bread and pouring a thick layer of sugar on top. The women talked as if he wasn’t there. “That boy ought to be grateful to you, Luvadia. You actually take care of him, unlike that Julie. What kind of woman leaves her child like that? A tramp, that’s what kind of woman. I mean, moving in with Will when she was just fifteen and not even married to him.  _Tramp_ ,” Luverne said decisively.

“Don’t forget those terrible things she accused her stepfather of doing,“ Luvadia added. “A tramp and a lying trouble-maker.” Merle’s guts clenched. Suddenly, he didn’t want that sandwich anymore. He started walking toward the front door, leaving the sandwich to the ants. “Oh no,” he heard his stepmother exclaim, “I think I just ruined the couch. I think the baby’s coming.”

“It’s way too early! You gotta go to the hospital!”

“Hell, no! They cut you open in the hospital and then you get cancer, just like Aunt Betty!” Luvadia groaned loudly and pressed her hands to her belly. “Get the midwife, this baby is coming  _right now_.”

“Merle, you go get Mabel Greaves!” Luverne hollered.

Old Lady Greaves’s shack was a half mile away. Merle approached it with trepidation. All the local kids swore she was a witch. As he was working up his courage up to knock, the front door opened. Mabel regarded him with faded blue eyes. The age-spotted skin of her face was tight against her skull, but her close-cropped white hair was still thick. “It’s Luvadia’s time, ain’t it. Hold on, let me get my bag.” An enormous, stinky tomcat stared over the threshold at Merle as he waited. Mabel came back out with a postal bag over one shoulder that looked so old, it could have been used by the Pony Express. She reached into a pocket of her dungarees, pulled out a silver dollar, and flipped it to Merle. “Go find somethin’ to do until dusk. Childbirth is women’s business. Don’t need no menfolk around.”

Running to fetch the midwife got Merle’s appetite going again so he headed toward town. He could get a cheeseburger and fries with that silver dollar. There were days when Merle managed to not think about his mother at all. This was not going to be one of them. As he walked, he didn’t see the dirt road that he followed or the fences that lined it as he let himself sink into memories that were so sweet that they hurt.

……………………

A familiar yellow Dodge Dart pulled up on the side of the road a little ways ahead of Merle. His face broke into a grin as the door opened and his mother got out. She was wearing denim hotpants, a flower-print shirt tied in a knot just above her belly-button, and cowboy boots. Her platinum-bleached hair was in two pigtails. As she walked toward Merle with her arms stretched out, a man hollered out his truck window at her, “Ride  _me_ , cowgirl!”

His momma’s hugs were the sweetest thing on God’s green earth. Better than ice cream, even. “Do ya know what day it is, baby?” she asked, smiling at him. She was crouched down so she was at his level.

“Tuesday?”

“It’s your birthday, silly!”

“It is?” Merle had no idea. His father hadn’t said a thing.

“Uh huh. That means it’s my birthday, too, remember? I had ya on my sixteenth birthday.” She booped him on the nose. “My best birthday present ever. Do ya know how old ya are now?”

Merle had to think about it. He held up one hand. “I was this many.” He held up a finger on his other hand. “Now I’m this many.” His forehead crinkled with concentration. “I’m six!”

Julie hugged him again. “Ooh, you’re so smart!” Then she pulled back, her hands on his shoulders. “We’re gonna go celebrate!”

“Right now?”

“Why not?”

“I’m s’posed to go to school. Look, the bus is comin’.”

His mother let out a small, playful shriek. “Oh, no, not the school bus! Let’s get outta here!” She jumped to her feet, grabbing Merle’s hand and running with him to the car. They scrambled inside and she slammed the door shut just as the bus passed by. “Whew,” she said, “we’re safe! No school today, just fun.”

“What we gonna do?”

“That’s a surprise.” She checked her lipstick on the mirror, put on her heart-shaped sunglasses, and pulled back out onto the road. Turning on the radio, she sang along.

_Shine on me sunshine_

_Walk with me world_

_It’s a skippidity doo da day_

_I’m the happiest girl, in the whole U.S.A._

What a day it was. The best day Merle ever had. They went all the way to Atlanta to visit the zoo, ate at McDonalds, and then Julie took him to a great big store and let him pick out five Hot Wheels from the toy department.  “It’s gettin’ late,” she said as they got back into the car. “I better get ya home.”

On the ride home, Julie was quieter, not singing along to the radio. “Merle, I got something to tell ya. I probably won’t be able to come see ya for a while.”

“ ‘Cause Daddy’s mad at ya?”

She let out a little giggle. “Nah. Your daddy’s always been mad at me. No, see, I’m movin’ to California. Ya ever heard of that place? Your daddy says it’s like a bowl of granola, nothin’ but fruits, nuts, and flakes. But I know some people out there. I’m gonna get some work and find us someplace to live and then I’ll come for ya. We can live in Hollywood together, how’s that? Is that a good idea?”

Merle didn’t know a thing about California or Hollywood or any of that. He just heard ‘live together’. “Promise, Momma?”

“Promise.”

Merle was the quiet one now as his mother talked about beaches and orange groves and movie stars. Her words filled him with an agony of longing. He wanted to go away with her right now and never go back to that airless trailer he shared with his father. Waiting was going to be the hardest thing he’d ever done.

“Ya okay there, li’l man?” his mother asked, ruffling his curls.

“Uh huh.” He chewed his bottom lip. “Um, ya can keep my Hot Wheels for me. I can play with them when ya come get me.”

Julie nodded. “Yeah. That’s a good idea.” She turned to give him a quick look of understanding; Merle didn’t want his father destroying his new toys in a rage. Looking back at the road, she said, “I’ll keep ‘em safe, don’t worry.” She started singing again:

_Open up, open up, open up that Golden Gate!_

_California, here I come!_

It was evening by the time Julie stopped the car at the end of the Dixon driveway. “Love ya, sweet boy,” she breathed as she gave him one last hug, so tight it was nearly crushing. “I’m gonna come get ya soon as I can!” she called after him as he walked toward the trailer.

Merle never heard from her again.

…………………….

It was dusk. His silver dollar long spent, Merle slipped into the trailer. He froze for a moment when he saw his father sitting on the couch, but Will Dixon was too far deep into his own mind to notice his son. A cigarette was burning to ash in his hand and he had a tumbler full of what was probably moonshine sitting in front of him on a TV tray.

Mabel Greaves was at the kitchenette sink washing her hands. “Your brother ain’t much bigger than a kitten, but he’ll be fine. He’s a fighter,” she told Merle. “Go in and see him.”

Luvadia was in her and Will’s bed, looking bone tired and smoking a Kool Menthol. Luverne fussed over a tiny bundle in her arms. “You can’t name him Daryl, Luvadia.”

“Why not?”

“Everybody’s gonna call them Merle and Derle. Or Meryl and Daryl. What’s wrong with Will Jr?”

“It’s my damn baby, I’ll name it what I want!”

Both women looked surprised when Merle walked over to Luverne and pulled a corner of the blanket back from the baby’s face. “Now, don’t let him get cold,” Luverne lectured. The baby was so very small. Merle could see veins clearly through translucent skin. Daryl’s eyes were a dark, cloudy blue, and they looked slightly crossed. He was an ugly little mite. “Your gonna have to take care of your baby brother. He’s had a hard start in life. Poor thing’s gonna be a runt.”

“Stop, insultin’ my baby, Luverne.”

Merle carefully took Daryl, tucking him into the crook of his arm. Of course Merle would always take care of him. Of course he would. He smiled. This shaved monkey-looking thing was his own flesh and blood. “Hey. I’m Merle. I’m your brother. I’m always gonna be around for ya. I’m never gonna leave ya.”


End file.
